The leaders of these people are the religious leaders of the polytheists who worship idols, such as the soothsayers and sorcerers among the polytheist Arabs, and the soothsayers in India, among the Turks, and elsewhere. Some of these people believe that when someone among them dies, he returns after death, speaks to them, settles his debts, returns what was entrusted to him, and gives them instructions. The figure they knew during his lifetime does indeed appear to them, but it is a devil assuming his likeness, whom they mistake for him.

Many who call upon shaykhs for help say:

“O my master so-and-so!” or “O Shaykh so-and-so, fulfil my need!”

Then they see a figure resembling that shaykh addressing them and saying:

“I shall fulfil your need and put your heart at ease.”

It then fulfils the person’s need or wards off his enemy. Yet it is a devil that has assumed the shaykh’s likeness, after that person associated partners with Allah by calling upon someone other than Him. I know of numerous incidents of this kind. Indeed, a number of my companions mentioned that they had called upon me for help during hardships that befell them.

One feared the Armenians, and another feared the Tatars. Each related that when he called upon me for help, he saw me in the air, warding off his enemy. I informed them that I had been unaware of this and had warded off nothing from them. Rather, it was a devil that had appeared to one of them and led him astray when he associated partners with Allah Most High.

The same has happened to several shaykhs among our companions in their dealings with their followers: one of them calls upon the shaykh for help and sees